May 2022

VOlUME 05 ISSUE 05 MAY 2022
A Research on the English Version of A Bite Of China From The Perspective of Skopos Theory
Qijun Chen, 2Bei Luo
1,2Xianda College of Economics and Humanities Shanghai International Studies University, China
DOI : https://doi.org/10.47191/ijsshr/v5-i5-43

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ABSTRACT

A Bite of China is a documentary about Chinese food culture. It not only describes China's rich food, but also shows the colorful rural life and spiritual connotation of Chinese people. It could be a window to show foreigners the beauty of China and the cultural traditions in every part of it. But the language in movies and TV shows has its distinctive features: the language in movies and TV shows is sound and fleeting, so the translation of movie subtitles must be appropriate and easy to understand. Skopos theory holds that the audience is the most important factor in determining the translation purpose. Therefore, the translation criterion under skopos theory has changed from “equivalence” to “appropriateness”, which enables translators to have greater autonomy in determining subtitle translation strategies on the premise of respecting the original text, thus not only achieving the communicative purpose of the target text, but also enabling the audience to understand the original film and television works.

Firstly, the paper analyses the skopos theory and current translation studies of A Bite of China through literature review. Then based on the subtitle translation of episode 5 of A Bite of China, it discusses the methods and strategies that can be used in subtitle translation from the perspective of skopos theory with the hope of finding out the appropriate translation strategies and methods as well as enriching researches on the English version of A Bite of China. For example, addition, deletion, etc., which can can not only preserve and promote Chinese cultural characteristics but also meet the target audience’s reading habits and thinking modes without losing the communicative intention.

KEYWORDS:

skopos theory; coherence rule; Chinese food; A Bite of China; subtitle

REFERENCES

1) Newmark, P. 2001. A Textbook of Translation. Shanghai, Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.

2) Nord, C. 2001. Translation as a Purposeful Activity-Functionalist Approaches Explained. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.

3) Vermeer, H. 1987. What does It Mean to Translate?. Indian Journal of Applied Linguistics.

4) Vermeer, H. 2000.Skopos and Commission in Translational Action[M]. New York: Routledg.

5) Yang, J. R. 2015. A practice report on the Chinese-English translation of A Bite of China.

6) Xihua, C. Adaptation and Selection in Translating Captions of an English-dubbed Chinese Documentary. Overseas English, 165-166+178. Anhui: Anhui Science and Technology Press.

7) Jian, G. 2015. A Study on Subtitling Strategies from the Perspective of Skopos: Taking the Fifth Episode of A Bite of China Ⅱ for Example.

8) Shuhua, W. and Ying, L. 2020. Research on Subtitle Translation Technology: The Status Quo, Problems and Suggestions. Beijing: China Academic Journals Electronic Publishing House.

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11) Jinlan, Z. 2004. Skoposthery and Translation Methods. Chinese Science & Technology Translators Journal, 36-38.

VOlUME 05 ISSUE 05 MAY 2022

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